I opened 12 bank accounts and silently benchmarked their UX.

I often wonder which industry, in general, has the best UX. But have you ever considered which industry should have the best UX?

Which industry needs to ooze trust, safety and security? I realised the answer was banking. You work most of your life for money, which you save in a bank, and then access your life-savings through an app. That app needs to be good.

I wanted to see which bank had the best UX, so I started out on a mission: to benchmark the major banks in the UK, and determine which is best.

You see, there are new banks—Monzo, Revolut and Starling—who have built billion-dollar businesses around the perception that they’ve revolutionised banking. They promise a new experience with slogans like “Banking made easy”, “A Radically Better Account” and “Changing banking for good”.

But are they actually any better, or is it all just brilliant marketing? To test this I opened an account with each bank, and then—without them knowing—benchmarked them against each other.

Let’s just focus on one key area: opening an account. Or rather, what is the experience of opening an account like with each bank.

Setting the ground rules

The industry can be pretty misleading at times. Promises of being able to “open an account within minutes” sound great, but don’t reflect what we’d consider to be a ‘real world experience’.

That’s why I set some ground rules. I will only consider an account being ‘active’ when I can do the following.

1. I can use my card in a shop. This includes receiving my PIN.
2. I have access to online banking on my mobile. This includes receiving my card reader (if needed).

The track was set, the banks unknowingly congregated at the starting line, and in ceremonial fashion I raised my UX starting pistol in the air…

“On your marks, get set…”

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